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I’m pleased to announce that Journal Register Company’s newspapers in Connecticut will be partnering with online Connecticut Statehouse news website CTNewsJunkie.Com to supplement our coverage of state government.

And state politics and government reporter Jordan Fenster will be taking a lead role on our previously announced “Citizens Agenda” project, a new approach to covering political campaigns that’s based on the issues most important to our readers instead of “the horse race.”

CT News Junkie has been led since 2006 by editor and lead reporter Christine Stuart, who has developed a reputation as one of the hardest-working journalists covering the Capitol.

Prior to joining CT News Junkie, Stuart was a local news and politics reporter for the Journal Inquirer of Manchester. Previously, she covered education, transportation and the Capitol for the Hartford Advocate.

Peacetime conversion. Corporate influence on politics. The unfair burden of student loans. The media’s obsession with New Hampshire and Iowa. The complete absence of coverage of the candidates and ideas of the Green Party and Libertarians.

While the Guardian focuses on the 2012 presidential race, our journalists in Connecticut will be applying the Citizens Agenda concept to two open and highly competitive races – the U.S. Senate seat being vacated by Joe Lieberman and the 5th District U.S. Congress seat being vacated by Chris Murphy (who is running for Lieberman’s Senate seat).

Over the next month, we’ll be holding a series of open forums, reaching out to readers via social media, surveys and other methods and meeting with specific groups and constituencies seeking to identify, separately, the issues that voters most want addressed by candidates in those two races.

Then, instead of assigning reporters to get the inside scoop on “process stories” from Linda McMahon‘s campaign manager, or a Democratic Party establishment operative, we’ll assign a reporter to each of the issues that’s identified.

So, instead of chasing the story about who is up and down in polling or fundraising, or the daily barrage of press release pot-shots exchanged between the campaigns, one of our reporters, for example, would be writing about how the U.S. Senate candidates would shape policy on the issue of taxation.

Another reporter might be writing in-depth about the issue of job creation, engaging with readers and trying to compel the candidates to respond with specifics on that topic.

Other reporters might be focusing on health care, or redevelopment of Brownfields properties … whatever issues are identified through the Citizens Agenda process.

The most-talked about issue of the night was “peacetime conversion” – whether the country will continue its policy of funding a military that can fight two wars at the same time, how we’ll invest the billions that have been spent on the war in Iraq, whether our foreign policy will improve or worsen instability in the Middle East, and energy independence.

Corporate influence in politics was also a theme, with multiple people expressing alarm about the “Citizens United” decision and the role so-called Super PACs are playing in this year’s campaigns.

Because the Citizens United decision does not require donors (some who are pouring millions into the support of or opposition to particular candidates) be identified until after the election, one participant Wednesday urged the media to focus its reporting on “unmasking” those donors and documenting the role of Super PACs.

There was plenty of criticism of and suggestions about the media’s role in political coverage.

We were urged to include Green Party candidates and Libertarian candidates, and the ideas put forth in their platforms, as part of our coverage. Most media fail to even include them in listings of who is running, one man said.

Another person criticized the media for allowing candidates to make points based on isolated statistics or trends that don’t see the “long view” or bigger context.

The “shallow” nature of Associated Press reporting, and the lack of international perspective in American newspaper and TV reporting, were decried.

Another participant asked why the national media and candidates were allowed to focus obsessively on “early state” primaries and caucuses such as Iowa and New Hampshire when they represent a tiny number of electoral votes.

One man said he is left at a loss sometimes in reading long New York Times pieces that chronicle a viewpoint from one perspective, and then a viewpoint from the opposite perspective, but that don’t help bring much final clarity or conclusion on the topic for readers. (“View from Nowhere,” anyone?)

And finally, participants in our first forum on Wednesday, wanted to know “what good it’s going to do” to identify Citizens Agenda issues considering politicians are politicians and probably won’t change.

“The ultimate goal of a citizens agenda is to bring the candidates to it, so that what people want the candidates to be discussing is actually addressed. Campaign coverage gains a clear purpose: information and access that is useful to people in getting their priorities addressed.”

What’s life like for a U.S. Senate candidate without a multimillion-dollar campaign war chest or connections to the party establishment?

Sylvester Salcedo

A little-known completely unknown candidate for the U.S. Senate showed up last night for the New Haven Register‘s first “Citizens’ Agenda” forum on what issues will be at the heart of our political coverage in 2012.

Salcedo was there just to listen to the two dozen residents who assembled at the New Haven Public Library for the open forum organized by New Haven Register Community Engagement Editors Ed Stannard and Angi Carter.

But the yellow legal pad be brought for taking notes was taken over by Leonardo’s coloring. And then there was the wiggling. And running away. And screaming. And throwing things.

I loved it because it reminded me exactly of any time I’ve tried to work with my 2-year-old son Cash in the room. That “I’m not alone!” feeling. This guy knows what it’s like!

And you’ve got to have some respect for an against-all-odds candidate who would spend two hours just listening to voters instead of spouting their own platform, while wrangling the most boisterous 2-year-old boy ever produced (after my own, that is – Cash would have destroyed that library).

Let’s see Chris Murphy bring his kids to the next campaign event, without aides or spouse to help.

And by the way, Salcedo seems like a pretty interesting guy. We’re looking forward to sharing his ideas with readers soon.

Matt DeRienzo is group editor of Digital First Media's publications in Connecticut, including the New Haven Register, Middletown Press, The Register Citizen of Torrington and non-daily publications including Connecticut Magazine, the Litchfield County Times and West Hartford News. Contact him at mderienzo@21st-centurymedia.com.